3/24 JFK to CLT (AA 327) B737- upgraded at T-48

3/24 CLT-DFW (AA 670) A321 upgraded at T-24, flight went out 20/20 with 6/16 clearing at the gate.

Don't get me wrong. It does happen. Depends on day of travel and where you're going. Most of my flights go through DFW and CLT. I'm at a 60% on those flights. I think that with the raised level of points with LPs and all, there are probably going to be a few less EXP and PPROs in the system than when they lowered everything during COVID-19 days. But that's just anecdotal, I'm sure if we all kept track it's going to be in that 50%-70% range that you mentioned.

This week in SWUs:

HND-LAX, AA26 (745pm departure time), Monday: cleared off the waitlist at ~25 hours prior to departure
JFK-DEL, AA292, Thursday: cleared at booking about 3 weeks prior to departure

(neither flown yet)

Edit to add: rolling LPs somewhere between 220k and 230k, so not particularly high

Tell me again how "pointless" EXP is and how useless SWUs are...

I guess it depends on whether you are happy with that range or not. I do not consider a 60% upgrade frequency to be useless. If there are people who expect to be upgraded 100% of the time, the problem is that the expectations are unreasonable. If anything under 100% has no value to someone then the answer for that person is to just book the higher cabin (and, yes, if you just pay for F every time, status has minimal value, though the EXP desk, preferential handling during IRROPS, and all the "rule bending" that goes on is still nice)

FWIW, anything under 100% is unacceptable to me for TATL or TPAC, which is why I plan to choose miles rather than SWU this year, so I can continue to just book J or F on partner airlines. But I'm extremely happy with 60% or 70% upgrade success for domestic travel.

t-100 2 FC left. T-72 2 FC still available. Next up is me at T-48. Wouldn’t the levels above me be upgraded if there were any on this flight. Really dont know why I care as it’s not a long flight. have a nice seat in MCE. It’s kind of a game

Just because there are 2 seats open does not mean that AA automatically upgrades whoever is at the top of the list. AA will almost always hold 1-2 seats open until right before departure for any last minute purchases.

Likely they are holding those 2 remaining seats open in hopes someone will pay for the upgrade or last minute travelers buys the seats outright

Im flying the HND-LAX route in a few weeks. How far in advance did you put in the SWU and do you remember how many cleared at the gate if any?

Ticket was purchased 26 days before departure, SWU was put in at that time.

Can't answer how many cleared at the gate as the flight isn't for another ~20 hours or so. Rough guess from seat map (I know...) is that 3 or 4 people cleared off the waitlist at the same T-25ish time that I did.

Do you have to be at the gate for your upgrade to clear?
 

I have a likely upgrade at the gate coming up, and a tight connection.

Do I need to be at the gate when upgrades are processed (40 minutes before departure, perhaps) in order to get upgraded?

Or will I be upgraded even if I’m not at the gate, but as long as I’m #1 on the list and there is at least one seat available?

Thanks.

You don't need to be at the gate. If you're #1 and get the upgrade you should see your seat refresh in the app, or just stop by the gate when you get there to get your new boarding pass if you're not using the app.

That said, we did go through a phase several years ago where some bad GA's would in fact skip over you on the upgrade list if you weren't at the gate when they processed upgrades. This completely defeated the purpose of mobile boarding passes or the ability to hang in the lounge until boarding started, etc. Fortunately I haven't heard of any reports of this nonsense in a while.

It's almost T-72 for lax-jfk. F has 5 seats open. J has 1 spot open.

What are the chances J gets upgraded to F and a few more go from Y to J? Is it common? When does it happen?

I'm a lowly gold this year so it's very unlikely for me but curious if they do move J to F to open up space.

I figured they would have done by now so they could sell J for last minute travel.

If it matters, Y looks more than half empty.

They don't move J>F to open up space for upgrades.

They will move J>F to open up space for more paid J.

Life would be so much better if people did like 5 seconds of research before posting. How many at t-48 as a platinum who very obvious never flies AA has my upgrade not clear do we get posted every week on various threds. I mean it shows a whole 1 seat available. My god!

Thanks for this. Makes sense.

I'd think they would continue to offer upgrades from Y to F for cash. So are those going to go empty now?

The offer i got to go Y to J/F started at $900 and went to $950 then $970 and finally to $1200 before it was pulled completely.